Visit Estes Park, town officials working to clarify district's role

There appears to be some misunderstanding among town officials and Visit Estes Park officials about the role local marketing district plays in the community.

That was apparent last week when VEP officials met with the Estes Park Town Board in a study session to discuss the marketing organization's 2016 operating plan, a marketing investment proposal, and the current IGA which is being updated.

The 57-page operating plan, which the town board had reviewed a few weeks earlier, outlined the marketing district's strategy for the upcoming year.

However, it did little to clear up just what Visit Estes Park does and where it's responsibilities lie, in the minds of many town board members.

"One of the things we have trouble about is (VEP) funding support of public events," Estes Park Mayor Bill Pinkham said at the outset of the meeting. "We can read (in the operating plan) about what the LMD can support. But, what has been missing is the public event component. At the end of this, it would be good to have an understanding of what that is."

Visit Estes Park President and CEO Elizabeth Fogarty, in response to a question by Trustee John Ericson, said the marketing district's major things for 2016 would be marketing to the international visitor, working with regional and state tourism officials, working with the visitor's center, and a focus on wellness tourism.

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Trustees then grilled Fogarty and Almond on a number of topics that included training town business managers, wellness branding, how much money is spent using outside contractors, a trending decline in the district's fund balance, gathering lodging statistics for projecting future revenue (VEP gets funding from a 2 percent lodging tax), sources of information regarding sales tax leakage at restaurants and retailers, and questions about a possible increase in the lodging tax next year.

Trustee Ward Nelson said near the end of the meeting that the marketing district's plans going forward weren't really forward-looking.

"I don't get it," Nelson said. "This sounds like you'll be patching up things you do now, not a vision of the future. I don't see some strategic plan to work with other organizations in town. I'm still a confused trustee."

Another topic of conversation was how Visit Estes Park was planning to move away from marketing individual town events and toward marketing the destination as part of the overall guest experience.

In a meeting held several weeks ago between town staff and VEP officials, it was pointed out that the town wanted VEP to invest in the individual marketing of several town events to help grow event attendance and guest spending.

VEP agreed and submitted a proposal for the town to grant the marketing district approximately $94,000. In return, VEP officials would use about $155,000 of its own funds, giving it approximately $255,000 to use.

That topic was briefly discussed at the end of the study session meeting and was tabled until the end of the year because of revenue concerns by the town.

While the two sides will meet again on Nov. 18 to firm up their IGA, Fogarty continues to be concerned by the questions that town officials ask in regard to the local marketing district's work in supporing town events.

"We have explained that we support events, but we don't do event promotion and that there is a difference between event promotion and destination marketing," Fogarty said a day after the meeting. "We tried to clarify that so the town could understand. We believe that every event should have a promoter and that they should meet with us. Every town event needs a promoter and a budget, but we're not promoters. We should be a part of the conversation, though."

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